17
Jul

The Body Image Project – “shoulder the burden”

July 17.

Hi.  My name is Erin, and I am my dad’s first born son.

This isn’t really a joke.  Although I was born female, I have never considered myself as such.

I was not raised as such.

I don’t mean this in a super-famous-right-now, Bruce-is-Caitlin Jenner kind of way.  I am not having a gender identity crisis.  Although I haven’t considered myself female, I haven’t considered myself male, either.

I’m not “girl.”  I’m not “boy.”  I’m just ME.

In the same way a frog doesn’t consider that he’s a frog, clouds don’t know they’re clouds, and in our daily life we don’t usually consider that we’re breathing (because we just DO IT), my gender is a non-issue.  It just IS.  It exists without my consideration, without need of acknowledgment or attention.

Yes, my gender is like that.

For the most part, my nondescript gender has been great.  I have never felt confined to any specific role due to the plumbing between my legs.  I have never felt limited in choice based on my sexual grouping, and I have never butted my head against any genital-induced ceiling.  (Ew.)  I am me ONLY AND JUST, not defined by any category, designation, class, or division.

Except for those times when I’m not.Read More

17
Jul

The Body Image Project – “stay abreast”

(Just a heads up, this post contains some explicit images.)

July 16.

Most parts of the human body remain gender neutral.

Hands, for example.  Both boys and girls have them.  Legs.  Arms.  Wrists, knees, neck, collar bones, stomach, back, buttcheeks.  Almost all parts of the body are common to both male and female of the species.  When I compare myself to my male counterpart, there are a lot of ways we are similar.  Although the length and size and girth and strength of our equivalent parts differ due to my feminine designation, the parts are the same.  Thighs are thighs, mouths are mouths, hair is hair.

All parts are the same, save two – genitalia, and breasts.

And, since genitalia are tucked neatly and privately away inside our clothes, breasts are most obvious distinction between male and female anatomy.

Breasts are, as our culture tends to show us all the time, the part of our body that makes us women.

Yep, breasts = women.

Also, breasts can be round and soft.  Voluptuous.  Attractive.  They are feminine at any size.  In our culture, breasts are considered sexy.  They are stimulating both visually and physically, and regardless of perspective they are considered sexual organs, part of our reproductive process.  On a level of awareness that most people miss, they are loving and nurturing, almost divine in their ability to produce manna-like nourishment from nothing but water and breath.

Growing up, as it is for most girls, the arrival of my breasts was an anxious, exciting, butterfly-metamorphosis experience.  I waited so eagerly.  So impatiently.  Whenever I would walk through the mall or the clothing section at the grocery store, I’d drag my feet through the lingerie department.  “Hey, there’s bras over there, maybe we should look.  You know, just in case.”  I was READY.  I was ready to need a pretty undergarment.  I was ready to do that fancy clip-it-behind-your-back thing, and the strip-it-off-without-taking-off-your-shirt thing from Flashdance.  I wanted boobs, and all the other fancy, womany, grown-up things that went with them.

Finally, after waiting FOREVER, my breasts started to come in.  At the start they were little lumps pushing against the inside of my shirt, not visible from the outside of the fabric, but visible from the inside when I tucked my face inside the neckhole of my t shirt.  (And yes, in the beginning I did that a lot.  I was super excited, duh.)  They grew slowly, they moved from little lumps to modest bumps,

then they stopped growing.

oh. my. goodness.

Hi.  My name is Erin, and I am one of the founding members of The Itty Bitty Tittie Committee.  (call sign: skittles)Read More

16
Jul

The Body Image Project – “give her a hand”

July 15.

HI.  My name is Erin, and I have huge hands.

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HUGE.  And I’m not just saying that.  I’m not being particularly hard on myself, I’m being quite literal.  Most people agree with me.

I call them “man hands.”  My sister-in-law calls them “shman hands.”  In high school, my friends called them clubs.  Or catchers’ mitts.  Bear paws, man mitts, huge grips, lobster claws.  Fists of steel.  I have been called “Mitsy,” “Handsy,” “Shmanny,” “Slappy,” and “Gripsy.”

Almost all of these names are legitimate.Read More

15
Jul

The Body Image Project – “grab that ass”

July 14.

About two weeks ago, I bought new underpants.

Some of you may think “what’s the big deal, it’s just a pair of underpants, everyone has them.”

True.  Everyone (hopefully) has and wears underpants.  (And if they don’t, I hope it’s by choice.)  Probably not a big deal.

For me, though, the new underpants were a super huge big deal, because in order to BUY underpants, you have to THINK about underpants, which means you have to think about what goes IN the underpants.

“My ass.”

I had to think about my ass.

As an anorexic, there are a few parts of my body that I try hard to NOT think about.  My stomach.  My hips.  The thick-skin-fat roll that smooshes out just under my bra strap along my back, south off my armpits along my shoulder blades.  My inner thigh, my inner knees,

and my rear end.

In order to buy underpants, just like buying a new pair of jeans or a swimming suit (both of which I detest shopping for equally as much), you have to think about the size, shape, and necessary confinement of your backside.  You have to consider what it looks like now, and what it will look like in your new clothing.

You also tend to consider what it should look like.

What you wished it looked like.

And aaaaah…   there’s the problem.Read More

13
Jul

The Body Image Project – “chunky monkey”

July 13.

Even though I haven’t starved myself in a very long time, I am an anorexic at heart.  I loved being thin.  I loved being skinny.  I loved, loved, loved the ridges of my abs, the distinction of my ribs, and the way my hip bones jutted out past my womb.  I loved the way my body felt at the tail end of a five day fast.  I loved the way reality got blurry and fuzzy, the empty, hollow feeling inside my body, the fist of hunger that pushed into my guts all the way through to my lower back, the soporific effect of calorie deficit and the lucid, crazy, more-real-than-real-life dreams it produced.

I know I’m probably not supposed to say any of that here.  I’m POSITIVE there are people that will think less of me, call me a freak, say “you need mental help,” and stop reading my words.

Doesn’t matter.  I have to own my truth, and this is it.

Right or wrong, good or bad, beautiful or horribly ugly, this is it.

This is ME.

Turns out, so this this.

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Hi.  My name is Erin.  I am a recoverING anorexic bulimic body dysmorphic.  I have three kids, stretch marks, a herniated belly button from three, full term pregnancies,

and fat.

My name is Erin, and I have fat.Read More

13
Jul

The Body Image Project – “thigh gap”

July 12

If there were ever any popular female aesthetic trend to take the prize for “stupid,” thigh gap has to be it.

It took me a while to decide whether I wanted to write this article at all.  Part of me feels that thigh gap deserves no acknowledgement, it is seriously that stupid, but after some consideration I decided to include it.

I might not give even one rat’s ass about thigh gap, but others do.

To those of you that disregard thigh gap comments or concerns in the same way you would the weather in China, HIGH FIVE.  Well done.  Keep doing what you’re doing, because you’re doing it right.

To those of you that hear thigh gap comments or concerns and sigh, roll your eyes, feel steam roll out  your ears, or are overcome by a sense of irritation that rivals lemon juice in a canker sore, FIST BUMP.  I do the same.

To the rest of you…  Just read.

Thigh gap is, without any doubt, the worst measure of anything healthy.

It is the worst measure of anything PERIOD.Read More

11
Jul

The Body Image Project – “without even a blemish”

July 11.

This is my mole.

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It is big.  It is flappy and brown and pronounced.

It is so big, the purple strap of my shirt just there gets caught on it.  My necklace gets caught on it.  My hair gets caught on it.

Some people think it’s gross.

Most people who see it (and are ballsy enough to speak up) ask me “have you considered getting that removed?”  The kids I know (and other people who lack the need for tact) tell me “WILL YOU PLEASE GET THAT THING CUT OFF.”  The Mr. asks me, “Has it started talking to you yet?”  My three year old nephew spied it, stopped speaking mid-sentence, paused for a moment, and said “I think I need to get that.”

He spent the next two minutes fingering my mole, our conversation abandoned.

“GET IT OFF.  It won’t come off.”Read More

11
Jul

The Body Image Project – “face forward”

July 10.

I can honestly say, of all the photos and body parts examined during The Body Image Project, this post makes me the most nervous.

I don’t want to write it.

I REALLY don’t want to take the picture.

I’m not sure when it happened, but at some point in the past 15 years my face changed shape.

It is now completely, 100% NOT symmetrical.

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As a perfectionist, THIS DRIVES ME INSANE.

As a woman, this makes me feel absolutely unattractive.

As a used-to-be-victim of serious, severe acne, this reinforces the conviction “don’t ever let anyone see your face ever again, HIDE THAT SHIT.”

I wish I could express to you the level of anxiety I feel when I look at that picture.  We’ve worked through skin and lips in The Body Image Project, so I’m (kind of, more every day) okay with those aspects of my face, but still.

I don’t just feel anxious, I feel FEAR.

Legitimate, deep-seated, borderline panic.Read More

10
Jul

The Body Image Project – “bees knees”

July 9.

When I was a kid, people called me “Chicken Legs.”

I get it, now, why they did that.  I have grown a child in my own image, and her knees are just as knobby and bumpy and walnutty as mine were at the same age.

This is Norah, age 9.

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Cute roundy little walnuts.  :)

In my head, my knees still look like that.  Or at least, I feel like they’re supposed to.  In my head, no matter how warped and messed up it makes me, my knees are supposed to look the same as my nine year old daughter’s.  They are supposed to look just like they did when I was 21 and 112 pounds.

They are supposed to look pre-pubescent, completely fat free, bony, and thin.

Skinny.

As an anorexic, there are a few places on your body where you can most easily judge your starvation progress.

Collar bones.  Elbows.  Wrists.  Hips, on the side, and pelvis in the front.  Pubic bone.  Ribs.  Cheekbones, jaw, chin.

And knees.Read More

08
Jul

The Body Image Project – “back up”

July 8.

“Boofers.”

My sister and I call them boofers.

Boofers, as defined by my sister and myself, is the wad of fat on both sides of the back, found just above the hip and waistband, along the back rim of the pelvis.  Most women over the age of puberty have them.  I do, for sure.  You probably do, too.

Here, I’ll show you.

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I’m not sure how or when we came up with the name, but I’ve always known what they are.

ALWAYS.Read More